Thursday, December 09, 2010

Amazon selling WikiLeaks cables

[updated below].While Amazon may have kicked WikiLeaks off its server because, in their own words :

"... it is not credible that the extraordinary volume of 250,000 classified documents that WikiLeaks is publishing could have been carefully redacted in such a way as to ensure that they weren't putting innocent people in jeopardy"

And while you're there, you may as well also not pick up this handsome WikiLeaks Freedom T-Shirt they are offering through their convenient Mastercard, VISA, or PayPal payment plan..PandaLabs and The Guardian have the details on the "anti anti-WikiLeaks" Operation Payback cyber attacks on MasterCard, Visa, the Swedish prosecution authority, Joe Lieberman, Sarah Palin, PayPal, Twitter, PostFinance, Amazon and EveryDNS.net by "Anonymous"..Unsubstantiated Anonymous Rumours From 'Sources' Dept.Crikey reports Julian Assange rape accuser Anna Ardin may have ceased co-operating with the Swedish prosecution and moved to the West Bank. Her blog is active again :

Or it's a psy ops. Or just bs. Getting harder and harder to tell. Going to get even harder.

1oam LOLsy Update : Since I first posted the above screenshot from Amazon with its offer of "All cables from 1-5000" and its one customer review at 3am, I see 120 more "customer reviews" have weighed in.

A sampling :

" I can't understand this. First Amazon kicks Wikileaks from their servers - because of these documents. Now they are trying to make money with them. Instead of buying this eBook, you should better spend Money for Wikileaks!"

"I bought this thinking that my bank accounts would be frozen, and I would be falsely charged with two counts of rape, but sadly neither were included in the price of this package."

"Is this a practical joke?"

"Amazon, this is incredible: 1. You ban WikiLeaks data from your server 2. and SELL the same information."

And so on and so on.

If you click the link above to Amazon now, you will find my original screenshot replaced with a brand new amended one which prominently reads :(DOES NOT CONTAIN TEXT OF CABLES). And in case you missed that, a little lower down : "This book contains commentary and analysis regarding recent WikiLeaks disclosures, not the original material disclosed via the WikiLeaks website."

Amazon are hypocrites for cutting off WikiLeaks from their hosting service then profiting off the material in this book, but the description of this product states "DOES NOT CONTAIN TEXT OF CABLES."

So it's not accurate to say Amazon is "sell(ing) those same docs for your Kindle." They are selling an "analysis" of those docs, at least according to the description. (I don't and won't own a Kindle, so I can't verify what is actually included in the book).

Very interesting, Alison. I didn't know that the part about not containing the text of the cables was a recent edition to the page. I should have looked at your screen shot more closely.

They must be in "damage-control" mode. They are taking a lot of heat in the reviews section for that page, and on many other news and commentary sites.

As I said earlier, they are still hypocrites. And they have shown potential customers of their S3 hosting service what can happen to your web presence if you make the mistake of entrusting it to them. We all must work to find alternatives to the services offered by Amazon, PayPal, Mastercard and Visa, and be ready to fight calls to move to a "cashless society."

Thanks for your coverage of this issue, and for all of the other good work you have done.